04/30, 10:56am

BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins believes that the future of tablets are on borrowed time, giving the hardware platform five years to live. The comments, made in an interview yesterday, suggest that the company may not make a successor to the BlackBerry PlayBook, a tablet released in 2011 that failed to take off at retail.

11/04, 7:30pm

RIM 7-inch tablet has faster processor, fixed storage

Blackberry has released the PlayBook 3G+ in the United Kingdom. The tablet has been made available in the country with a single storage capacity of 32GB, and while the 3G data connection is a welcome addition, it does not have the capability of connecting to the newly-launched and faster national 4G network.

07/30, 8:10am

Apparently stillborn 10-inch BlackBerry PlayBook revealed

Vietnamese site Tinhtehas received images of the rumored, but unreleased, 10-inch BlackBerry PlayBook leaked images tablet. The tablet gets torn down as evidence that it is authentic with its innards splayed to reveal what appears to be a device that is ready to ship. However, all reports suggest that the device was stillborn and that this production-ready example may be one prepared ahead of what appears to have turned into an aborted product launch.

03/15, 6:30am

RIM says PlayBook will get BB 10 after smartphone

RIM has confirmed with TechRadar that the BlackBerry PlayBookwill get the forthcoming BlackBerry 10 OS when it is ready. The BlackBerry 10 OS is based on the same QNX platform as the PlayBook OS and is currently in the process of being redesigned for an optimal smartphone experience. The move to update the PlayBook tablet to a variation of the same OS as its mobile phones will follow a strategy that has been adopted by both Apple’s iOS as well as Google’s Android.

02/21, 6:15am

RIM releases long-awaited OS 2.0 for PlayBook

RIM has finally made the long awaited major upgrade to the original BlackBerry PlayBook OS available for download today, as had been rumored. Almost inconceivably, and around a year since the device first launched, the PlayBook OS 2.0 allows users to enjoy native calendar, messaging and e-mail apps. The new e-mail app also includes an extended unified function, integrating not only multiple e-mail accounts as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter messages.

02/02, 10:00pm

Promotion runs for two weeks

Research In Motion is currently running a promotion for Android developers, handing out free BlackBerry PlayBooks to devs that submit apps to the BlackBerry App World. The program was announced by RIM's VP of developer relations, Alec Saunders, in a recent Twitter post.

11/24, 4:30am

RIM offering its PlayBook from $199 directly

RIM is now shipping its BlackBerry PlayBook at sale prices directly from its webstore. Users can buy up to three of the tablets in one transaction with the sale ending on December 3. Each model is being discounted by a massive $300 bringing the 16GB Wi-Fi only model down to just $199.

11/22, 3:25pm

RIM demos e-mail, calendar, contacts for PlayBook

RIM used the BlackBerry Innovation Forum to give a video demo of its long overdue native email, contacts and calendar for the BlackBerry PlayBook. Screenshots (embedded below) taken from the presentation show that the e-mail client looks very similar in its layout to the approach adopted in iOS and Android on tablets, where the inbox is placed on the left, with the reading pane on the right. RIM had previously struggled to find a work around for email as its BlackBerry phones don't allow multiple access portals for security purposes.

10/25, 3:15pm

Jobs had to be pushed to use ARM in iPad

The hot-selling biography of Steve Jobs has revealed that the Apple CEO at one point wanted to use Intel's Atom chip for the iPad. He had contended that Intel was reliable for mobile chips, even when the iPhone was already shipping with ARM. Then-key executive and later Nest Labs founder Tony Fadell was not only adamant that ARM would be better but even threatened to resign on the spot at a board meeting where Jobs was making the case for the Atom.